The promotion cycle for the 2022-23 NHL season has officially started to kick into gear. This week, the NHL is holding its European media tour in Paris — its first in-person event on the continent since prior to the pandemic.
The league is also re-starting its NHL Global Series games in Europe for the first time since 2019. This year, the San Jose Sharks and Nashville Predators are heading over in October. In preseason action, Roman Josi and the Predators will visit SC Bern in Swtizerland on Oct. 3, while the Sharks face Eisbarden Berlin in Germany on Oct. 4. Then, the two squads will meet up in Czechia to open their regular seasons against each other on Oct. 7 and 8.
In November, the Colorado Avalanche and Columbus Blue Jackets will square off for a pair of games at brand new Nokia Arena in Tampere, Finland.
I haven't seen any mention of Canucks players participating in this week's media tour — although Jacob Markstrom is there. And some North American rightsholders, like Sportsnet and ESPN, are on hand, delivering news tidbits.
The most interesting notes I've seen so far have come from deputy commissioner Bill Daly. In conversation with Elliotte Friedman and Jeff Marek of Sportsnet, Daly expressed optimism that the World Cup of Hockey will return for the first time in eight years in 2024. He's also bullish on the league's revenue projections, and suggested that the salary cap could potentially start ticking up again a little sooner than expected.
"I've seen some preliminary estimates recently which would make me more optimistic on the cap gong up sooner whether that's in two seasons or three seasons, I think it's more likely than not two seasons rather than three,"
he told Friedman and Marek.
If the cap does start to rise again following the 2023-24 season, that could be particularly good news for Elias Petterson and Vasily Podkolzin. Both players will see their current deals expire that summer.
Pettersson will have arbitration rights, a base salary of $7.35 million, and be just one year away from unrestricted free agency. Think of it as the Matthew Tkachuk scenario. The Canucks will likely want to sign him to a long-term deal, but he'd have the option of accepting his qualifying offer and walking straight to free agency. If he's not happy with the contract terms that the Canucks present — or just wants a change of scenery — he could also threaten to walk and force a trade, like Tkachuk did.
Podkolzin will be coming out of his entry-level deal, and won't have arbitration rights at age 23. There has been plenty of hype in the media about the big winger's potential over the last couple of weeks — and while I like Podkolzin, I think that's just idle summer discourse. I'm hopeful about his development — and hopeful that have some fellow Russians in the dressing room could benefit him, although he seemed to adjust very well to North American culture last season. But it's far too early to say whether he'll be worthy of a juicy second contract. For now, we can cross that bridge when we come to it.
I also wonder Daly's teaser could have any impact on the negotiating strategy for J.T. Miller. Yes, he'll be two years older in two years' time. But if there's more money in the system at that point and he can continue to play at a high level, maybe there's a better opportunity to maximize total earnings by taking a shorter-term deal now, then looking at a higher AAV in a couple of years' time.
Can the Canucks make that work? They'll have Micheal Ferland's LTIR hit of $3.5 million coming off the books next season, as well as the $2.4 million in dead money assigned to Braden Holtby ($1.9 million) and Jake Virtanen ($500,000).
CapFriendly shows that Vancouver has nearly $61 million committed to just 13 players in the 2022-23 season, leaving a projected $22 million in cap space to re-sign Bo Horvat and Miller — if they were to go down that road — as well as eight other players.
The struggle is real.
And that's why we're seeing a bit of a stall all around the league, signing-wise, as the end of summer draws near. This week, veteran forwards Paul Stastny and Phil Kessel both signed on with new teams on contracts of just $1.5 million. Stastny, 36, went from $6.5 million in 2020-21 to $3.75 million when he returned to Winnipeg last season. In Carolina, he has a no-trade clause and a crack at a $500,000 bonus if the Hurricanes win the Stanley Cup.
Kessel doesn't turn 35 until October 2, so he isn't quite old enough to have bonuses included in his new contract with Vegas — though perhaps the noted poker aficionado can make it up at the tables? He's coming out of that monster eight-year, $64 million extension that he signed with Toronto under Dave Nonis at the beginning of the 2013-14 season — a lifetime ago, in NHL years. And despite all the guff that he takes for his physique, Kessel didn't just play out that entire contract — he didn't miss a game, although he did take a bit of a mulligan last season when he played just one shift in a road game in Detroit in March before flying back to Arizona for the birth of his first child.
We waited 35 years for Keith Yandle to break Doug Jarvis' Ironman record of 964 games last January. His streak was snapped in March, at 989 games. Kessel goes into the new season at 982 — and is going to need to keep Vegas's aggressive injury bug at bay for at least a month or so in order to become the NHL's new all-time games-played leader.
Some other veterans who are still without contracts include Joe Thornton, Brian Boyle, Tyler Bozak, Kris Russell, Sam Gagner, P.K. Subban, Cody Eakin and Tyler Ennis. Younger unsigned UFAs include Sam Steel, Zach Senyshyn, Daniel Spring, Michael Dal Colle, Brendan Perlini, Zach Aston-Reese and Evan Rodrigues.
As for former Canucks, perpetual PTO guy Alex Chiasson has not yet found a home, and neither has Tyler Motte — surprisingly. Brad Richardson and Justin Bailey also remain unsigned.
The Canucks are currently sitting at 45 of 50 allowable NHL contracts for next season. And while CapFriendly shows them already at more than $85 million, they'll be easily cap-compliant with Ferland's LTIR cushion. They may also be looking at putting Tucker Poolman's $2.5 million back onto the injured list, depending on how he manages with his migraines in preseason.
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